The unseen costs of a shifting school calendar
A Grade 7 student in Baguio City recently died after slipping on the way home during heavy rain. It’s a heartbreaking tragedy made even more painful by the fact that it was preventable. As we mourn this young life cut short, we must also confront a difficult question: Are our academic policies truly grounded in the realities of our climate, our communities, and the safety of our learners?
For decades, the Philippine school year began in June. That schedule, although inconvenient due to the rainy season, was something the system was adapted to. However, in 2014, a shift was pushed, one based on the idea of aligning our academic calendar with “global” standards, supposedly to better integrate the Philippines into international academic systems, particularly in Western standards. This shift moved the start of classes to August or even September for some institutions, including basic education schools.
Then came the pandemic, and everything changed. Online and modular learning took over. We saw firsthand the pitfalls and values of flexible learning systems. We also realized something important, that education must respond not only to abstract goals like international alignment, but also to deeply local needs such as safety, equity, access, and environmental realities.
More recently, amid record-breaking summer heat, the school year was again shifted back to June. The argument this time: the intense temperatures in April and May posed health risks for students. Data shows that in 2024 and this year, numerous schools reported cases of heat exhaustion and even heatstroke among students. The irony is, we are a country in the tropics, yet most of our public schools are not equipped to provide even the most basic comfort to students in extreme weather. Classrooms lack proper ventilation, electric fans are scarce or broken, and air-conditioning is a luxury almost unheard of in most government schools. The past Department of Education (DepEd) administration funneled confidential funds, shrouded in secrecy and unexamined by the public eye, while students suffered from extreme conditions.
And yet, this return to the old schedule has placed us once again in the middle of the rainy season. This is especially dangerous in a country like the Philippines, where typhoons, monsoon rains, flooding, and destructive winds are a yearly reality. Or like my hometown, Baguio City, where landslides, fogs bringing zero visibility, flash floods, and slippery terrain are persistent hazards.
To add to the frustration is the ongoing confusion about who gets to decide whether to suspend classes during inclement weather. The DepEd refers the decision to local government units, while LGUs sometimes wait for formal guidance from DepEd, and now the Department of the Interior and Local Government taking on the task of announcing class suspensions. Students are forced to push through floods or risk slippery roads. Some joke bitterly that they now swim to class “like fish” just to meet attendance requirements. Ironically, the government also warns the public to avoid floodwaters due to health risks like leptospirosis, yet students are forced to push into floodwaters in the name of academic compliance.
We are caught in a cycle of reactionary policymaking, shifting academic calendars back and forth, hoping that one version might finally “work,” but never truly addressing the core issue: the Philippines is a country of diverse local conditions, and a one-size-fits-all national calendar is no longer appropriate.
This tragedy pinpoints the urgent need to revisit and rethink our academic scheduling policies, not just in the interest of efficiency or global competitiveness, but in the name of student safety and well-being. What we need is not another arbitrary shift in calendar months, but an honest, science-based, and locally grounded approach to education planning.
Why can’t school divisions be empowered to suspend, adapt, or shift schedules based on real-time weather and climate conditions? Why are we so reluctant to institutionalize flexible learning when the pandemic has already proven its necessity and feasibility?
The DepEd, Commission on Higher Education (CHEd), and our LGUs must be reminded: education policy is not just about administrative convenience or alignment with foreign systems. It is about our children’s lives. That student in Baguio did not die because of mere rain. They died because of policy decisions that failed to prioritize safety in favor of structure.
Have we learned nothing from the pandemic? Or are we doomed to forget the very lessons we once swore to remember—that learning should not come at the cost of life, that flexibility saves lives, and that context matters? The memory of this young student must not fade into just another news story. It must ignite change. Localized, flexible, and context-aware educational policy is no longer a bold idea. It is a moral imperative.
—————-
Kurt Zeus L. Dizon is an assistant professor at Saint Louis University in Baguio City.
